Use soy sauce and calamansi not as sawsawan, but as a marinade for chicken thighs. When cooked, the toyomansi caramelizes into a glossy, syrupy coat.
Combine soy sauce and calamansi juice and you get toyomansi, a classic all-purpose Filipino sawsawan (dipping sauce). It comes as a partner to many dishes like inihaw (grilled meats), bulalo, siomai—just about anything that could welcome more salt and tang.
This pan-seared chicken steak uses toyomansi as a marinade. Brown sugar rounds out the soy sauce and calamansi while helping the marinade caramelize into a glossy lacquer. With just a few simple ingredients, this dish becomes a no-brainer weekend meal—just make sure to let your chicken marinade an hour before cooking!
Marinate chicken: Combine soy sauce, vinegar, onions, garlic, calamansi juice, and brown sugar in a mixing bowl or baking dish. (You can toss in the squeezed calamansi for extra flavor.) Stir to dissolve brown sugar.
Add chicken thigh fillets to the marinade. Cover with plastic wrap and let marinate in the refrigerator for 1–2 hours.
Cook chicken: Heat 1 tbsp neutral oil in a pan over medium heat. Remove chicken from marinade (don’t discard it), letting any excess drip off before transferring to the pan skin side down. Cook until the chicken skin has darkened and crisped up a bit. Flip to cook the second side until browned.
Cook marinade: Add about ½ cup of marinade to the pan, or just enough to cover the bottom. Continue cooking, flipping chicken every now and then as the marinade thickens into a sauce, until chicken is fully cooked through.
Serve: Slice chicken thighs into strips. Transfer to individual serving plates or bowls with steamed rice, atchara, and calamansi.
